LA Opera’s Library Project presents more than 90 free opera talks each season in libraries all over the Los Angeles region. These insightful talks, given by LA Opera Community Educators, address history, literature, philosophy and fine arts within the context of opera.

LA Opera’s Community Educators are trained experts who address civic and social organizations, philanthropic groups, schools and library audiences throughout Southern California, free of charge. For more information about LA Opera’s Community Educators, please e-mail educom@laopera.org or call 213.972.3157.

How Beaumarchais Saved the American Revolution and Ensured the Future of French Theater

Figaro: I may truly be called both a Chance Child, and a Child of Chance. By Chance was I begot, by Chance brought into the World, by Chance was I stole, by Chance am I found, by Chance have I lived, and by Chance I shall die. Chance is Nature’s Sovereign, and must be mine. Suzanne: Yes, and by...
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02/26/2015

A Note from Music Director James Conlon

Come lo sono i moderni mariti: per sistema infidel, per genio capricciosi e per orgoglio, poi tutti gelosi. That’s the way it is with modern husbands: unfaithful on principle, capricious by nature and out of pride, jealous. So speaks Rosina (now the Countess) about her husband Count Almaviva (a...
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02/23/2015

The Barber of Seville: A Conversation with Rodion Pogossov, Elizabeth DeShong and LA Opera's Josh Winograde

Meet the The Barber of Seville 's Figaro and Rosina - Rodion Pogossov and Elizabeth DeShong - in a lively conversation with LA Opera's Josh Winograde today at Noon!
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02/19/2015

New members of Board of Directors

LA Opera General Director Plácido Domingo announced today that six new board members have been elected to the company's Board of Directors since the opening of the 2014/15 season. "I am delighted to be collaborating with these newest members of the LA Opera family," said Mr. Domingo. "LA Opera’s...
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02/18/2015

7 Questions for Figaro: Meet The Ghosts of Versailles' Lucas Meachem

Seven questions for Lucas Meachem The 6’3” baritone, who made his LAO debut in 2009 as Figaro in The Barber of Seville, is back on our stage as Figaro once more…this time in The Ghosts of Versailles. Welcome back to Los Angeles! What are you hoping to experience this time around while you’re her...
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02/06/2015

"The Barber of Seville" — A Note from Music Director James Conlon

“ La musica ai miei tempi era altra cosa…” (“Music in my time—i.e., in the olden days—was different…”) declares the ever grumpy Doctor Bartolo in the second act of Gioachino Rossini’s The Barber of Seville . Much had changed in the short space of time that separated the composer’s birth from his...
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02/04/2015

Tea and Stamina

This is the third in a series of guest posts by acclaimed mezzo-soprano Lucy Schaufer who is singing in all three operas of the Figaro Trilogy. Well, here it is Wednesday, 5:30am, after our final orchestra tech rehearsal last night and I should be sleeping. If only. You’ll come to find many singe...
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02/03/2015

Help Support Artistic Excellence at LA Opera with a Charitable Remainder Trust

As we begin the New Year, this may be a good time to consider a unique way of giving which will benefit both you and LA Opera. Charitable contributions are crucial to LA Opera’s mission of presenting world-class opera while spreading the joy of opera throughout our community through our renowne...
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02/02/2015

Thomas May: "The Ghosts of Versailles" Haunts a New Century

By Thomas May There’s an entire category of landmark operas that originally met with resistance from their own composers. Take Ariadne auf Naxos. In its first version, the work posed so many problems that a frustrated Richard Strauss shelved the project for several years. And when he was approach...
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